After work on Friday, I dropped into Andrew's place for another skirmish game using his home grown two-page rule set. Andrew picked a force with a value if 32 points and then I picked mine. Roughly, Andrew had two magic users cost 4 ability level 3, two 3 figures groups ditto, two 2 figure groups costing 3 ability 2, one or two characters cost 3 ability 2 and the remainder made up of cost 2 ability 1.
I went with a Pulp Japanese force in reply - one ability 3 officer, three ability 2 female characters, four ability 1 junior leaders and eleven ability 0 riflemen - let's see how it went.
The playing area - Andrew has a plethora of lovely box sets of various genres from which he can select a large variety of playing surfaces, to which he then adds some stunning terrain pieces
My crew - Grade 3 officer out in front
The three Grade 2 damsels, with Junior Leaders behind them.
Andrew's grade 1 figures (apologies for the poorer quality of images, lighting on this side of the table wasn't as good!)
Grade 3 magic user flanked by two Grade 2
A Grade 3 multi base
.jpg)
The other Grade 3 magic user - my favourite figure from Andrew's force!
Grade 3
Grade 1
The IJA advancing in bounds!
Enemy react
Andrew has introduced a new refinement - the possibility to interrupt the enemy during movement. Given the "era" and weapons, this makes sense. It works on the same simple mechanism as the rest of the rules. Any figure with a "missile" weapon can interrupt any movement he/she can see. Simply roll the standard 9 on 2 D6 to succeed - then roll again to see if you hit. The moving figure rolls saves as usual.
On this occasion, I think the kneeling rifleman took out one of Andrews Grade 1 figures during a movement interruption phase - first blood to the Japanese!
Andrew moved forward with his two level 3 groups and engaged in fisticuffs with a Geisha, a Junior Leader and a rifleman
The Butchers Bill on Andrews side so far - I had lost a single rifleman to a magic user.
The combat continues
Second group of 3 prepares for combat
A couple of random views, including excellent terrain pieces below
The Grade 3 officer leads a charge against Andrews second Grade 3 group, as the first combat continues in the background
Having driven back the first group with two wound points, the officer led a couple of others who were within reach (6") to reinforce the other combat
Victory ensued -mainly thanks to the riflemen - the Grade 2 Geishas are all talk and no action, rolling 4 or 5 and adding 2 - but the riflemen consistently rolled 9 or 10 and Andrew only passed his save rolls about 50% of the time. The female Grade 3 magic user from Andrews team engaged in a single combat with the Grade 1 standard bearer and rolled 11, add 3 = 14. The standard bearer cannot equal that BUT any double 6 is always a success ie automatic hit if attacking or success if defending....
So, I had to take a picture of this!
Ha, evil hag, I am still alive!
And next turn, a group attack ensued...
..... with this result!
My riflemen took some pot shots at the Grade 1 figure behind the barricade and took him out!
Andrews Grade 2 hero charged the three riflemen, dispatching one of them, but was then engaged by the Grade 3 officer and two Grade 2 Geishas - this time, they all scored hits, and the hero perished. Game well and truly over after about three hours play, including a meal break for some very nice Chinese takeaway food!
Nice end to the working week and it's good to have an opportunity to get these figures onto the table - next time, I might use the French or one of the Chinese contingents!
Thanks for dropping by and please do leave a comment. I am running a little experiment - my AAR's generally seem to get less comment than plain eye candy posts - eg the post preceding this has 44 comments (ok 22 and 22 replies!) and that's probably one of the top three comment "scores" on my blog of all time, whereas game reports get 20-30 (10-15) generally, which I find a bit odd?
Looks like a fun time! I love genre-crossing games like this.
ReplyDeleteThanks Bill! "Genre-crossing" lol I like that...sounds vaguely dodgy though, like cross-dressing😂
DeleteHa. I was thinking Gender-crossing.
DeleteFirst, I like the idea of impulse interruption but would hesitate to allow every figure to do so. That might slow the game.
ReplyDeleteSecond, try not to overthink commenting on paint vs play. I do not think it odd at all. It takes a lot more effort to read through a BatRep and formulate a useful comment than it does to see a pretty photo or two and say, "cool!" Some of us have short attention spans and not enough time.
Thanks Jon, I don't think the games will ever be much more than 8-20 figures per side, and a lot of them don't have a missile weapon anyway, so it hopefully should not become to onerous.
DeleteRe my experiment, I am not overly concerned by the fact, but it just seems quite noticeable .... I think it may hold true for other blogs as well .....
Looking back at my four most recent BatReps, I see no material drop-off in commentary.
DeleteYou would be the exception that proves the rule, Jon!
DeleteI could make a comment about being exceptional but I will refrain.
DeleteA fine looking game and one the reminds me very much of my Mordheim days, now long gone, although I still have my Witchunters. I've noticed that on many Blogs the shiny painted things post tend to get more replies than AAR's. Not sure why, but maybe Jon's comment above sums up many viewers approach to things these days.
ReplyDeleteThanks Steve, Jon could well be right re the effort required to make a meaningful comment on a game report versus a PBJ post! It doesn't concern me, it was just something I had noticed over a couple if years.
DeleteLooks like a fun game
ReplyDeleteThanks Scotty..it was certainly fun for me! I rolled some good dice, including that double six to save the standard bearer, and, not included in the report, one of the geishas did the same on offence to finish off the hero swordsman in the last action of the game!
DeleteYes, I was definitely not helped by poor dice rolls (& Keith was rolling well) - although I could have been more patient & thinned his ranks more before charging in..... particularly as it was his rank & file that did the most damage!
DeleteNice looking game and Chinese food as well. Sounds like a great time.
ReplyDeleteCheers Richard, it certainly was an enjoyable evening!
DeleteHaha...thanks StuRat, always nice to have a new first time caller on the show. You wouldn't know the system of course, we are making it up as we go along ( or play testing if you want to use a grown up term!) In fact, Andrew suggested that the Can I Do This roll be reduced to a single one for every figure who could potentially fire, but we decided the limited number of figures didn't really require that. Your idea is a pretty good one though, so maybe we will trial that next time.
ReplyDeleteAs to the names, with the mixture of genres, as mentioned by Bill above, names as asuggeted would not work for my Pulp force. In the rules as written, 3 is Hero, 2 is Senior Leader and 1 is Junior Leader, so maybe I can stick to those, or just describe the figure without reference to their ability value?
Not sure what happened to StuRats comments - maybe I accidentally deleted them - although I would expect to see a tag saying the comment had been deleted....weird!
DeleteJust as a side note, those descriptions are only used in the AAR for reader clarity...in the game itself, I would just say "My officer is attacking your hero" etc.
ReplyDeleteBox Cars for the win (or to survive). In my home brew sets I always have a "max die roll always succeeds mechanic" (as well as a "low die roll is always a bust"). It nicely takes care of trying to figure out what to do when the modifiers exceed the dice--and they do simplify things in the end. Seeing this game report, it makes me want to gin up some terrain tiles for skirmish games. Any rules set that can seamlessly mix Japanese Pulp with Barbarians and Magic Users has caught lightning in a bottle!
ReplyDeleteThanks Ed - simplicity & not having to look up much (if at all) is the aim. Players should be able to get rid of the dull crunchy mechanics - some like that but they make for tedious games!
DeleteYes, echoing Andrews comments, I find myself drawn more and more to a game where I can roll the dice (or turn a card) and intuitively know the result, without having to consult tables and add/subtract a multitude of factors! For the pulp/skirmish games, I do like the idea of individual character traits, but the extra complication in having these may outweigh the attractiveness.....
DeleteJust the sort of thing for a Friday night after a long week at work. I keep saying I'd like to do some AARs, but as all the gaming is around at other people's places, at least until the kids move out, I feel a little reticent about constantly interrupting the flow of a game to post pictures on my blog. I certainly think AArs have their place though, if not to garner comments then to serve as an aide memoir in years to come when it will be nice to recall fun games. There are so many games we have forgotten as a group, where only one or two individuals will have a hazy recollection.
ReplyDeleteThanks Lawrence. You are obviously a more considerate guest...it has never occurred to me that taking a few seconds every turn or two for a couple of pics would upset anyone or slow the games down; maybe, behind the forced smiles, they are seething with frustration😆
DeleteYes, what Keith said...........
ReplyDeleteThe thinking behind the 2 rolls is that the enemy has to react first & then do something. In the game it was just shooting that Keith did but there is the option for moving as well (if you make the roll)
ReplyDeleteOh, Great looking game sir.
ReplyDeleteThank you Michal, Andrews scenery really adds to the visual appeal of the game!
DeleteNice looking tiles. Did what was on the tiles affect things at all? (blocking terrain, faster on roads, etc) Or is it just eye candy?
ReplyDeleteAnd I forget to set it to notify me of replies....hence the second post.
DeleteNo, the flat 2d stuff was just eye candy - the 3d stuff was cover etc. If a target was in cover, they got to roll 3 D6 & pick the highest 2 for their defence roll.
DeleteI just threw that terrain out very quickly, some games we have had, they have represented underground areas, where anywhere not on a tile is rock & hence blocks move & LOS.
What Andrew said! 😉
DeleteLike those figures. They're giving me potentially expensive ideas!
ReplyDeleteThanks Rob. I have really enjoyed building up this Pulp collection, with small numbers of lots of different troop types! Mind you, some of the character figure are quite pricey, but you only need one of each!
DeleteCatching up on blogs, I'll add my two cents. First, nice to see a game played with some explanation of what is going on and how it works. I would agree it is easier to post an ooh, shiny painted figure comment than a thought on an AAR post.
ReplyDeleteThe game reports are eye candy workouts or technical reports on mechanics used or how the dice mistreated me stories and sometimes gripping narrative.
I have tended to shorter reports if using published rules, longer reports for games where it seemed explanations helped the narrative. But delving into why a piece such as this one is not producing PBJ levels of comments will only lead to frustration, I mean, herding cats comes to mind.
Thanks Joe, and, in the end, this post has reached a decent comment count, although there are a lot of extra replies from both Andrew and me included in the total!
Delete